Latest / Only Fee-Only / #66 - Breaking Moulds: The Journey from Engineering to Finance - Allen Mueller

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#66 - Breaking Moulds: The Journey from Engineering to Finance - Allen Mueller · Only Fee-Only

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: How's it going everyone?
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Welcome back to the only fee only podcast and, as always, thank you so much for being here.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: In this episode we got to talk to Alan Mueller, who is the founder of seven Saturdays financial which, by the way, unbelievable name for financial planning firm.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: I think that a lot of people wish that they could have seven Saturdays, and he his whole mission.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: What he does is to make that a reality for people and to really give people a different way to look at what it actually means to live an intentional life and that's one of the words that kept coming up and that I always think about when we're talking to Alan is intentionality and owning your own intentional life and really understanding what you want for yourself.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: He was in a completely different industry before he got into financial planning and we had the privilege to meet him towards the beginning of that journey, but now he's full time doing it for people and absolutely doing a phenomenal job.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Here is Alan Mueller on the only fee only podcast.
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: What's up everyone, welcome to another episode of the only fee only podcast.
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: I'm Peter Travolo.
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: I'm here with my co-host, brock Buckles.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: How's it going today, brock?
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: Doing great.
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: How are you, peter?
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: Love and life.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: And today we have Alan Mueller on from seven Saturdays financial out of Dallas, texas.
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: We're really excited to have him on the show and letting him share his experience of becoming a financial advisor and being a career changer.
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: So, alan, welcome to the show man.
• 1:41
  Speaker 3: Thank you.
• 1:41
  Speaker 3: Happy to be on, really excited about the opportunity, so appreciate it guys.
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: You bet man, so it's been really cool to watch you grow your business.
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: But for those who don't know who you are, in about seven Saturdays you want to give a quick 30, 60 second overview of who you are and who you're currently serving.
• 1:59
  Speaker 3: Yeah for sure.
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: So I'm a financial planner.
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: I own and operate seven Saturdays financial.
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: I like to describe myself as an engineer turned finance nerd, so this is actually my third career.
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: I'm sure we'll get into that.
• 2:12
  Speaker 3: But yeah, I live in Dallas, Texas area with my beautiful wife and our two little girls.
• 2:17
  Speaker 3: And that's a quick 30 second pitch.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, to the point, dude, I love it.
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: So tell us, yeah, tell us about the kind of the beginning.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: What industries were you in?
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: What did you do?
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: How did you kind of end up?
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Let's get to the point of how you ended up deciding that you wanted to get into finance.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: So let's cover everything before that and then we'll get into the brass tacks of the financial world.
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: All right, perfect.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: So it's a long story how much time you got.
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: As long as you need, brother, let's do it Perfect, All right.
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: So we'll start way back 10, 12 years ago.
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: Initially got interested in personal finance when I stumbled across the idea of fire, financial independence, retire early.
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: I started out my career in engineering and I was working a desk job in Dallas and just sitting in the cubicle really started to sink in that you know, if I was on the default path I was on, I'd be spending nine to five every single day for the next 40 years sitting in an office, except for maybe two to three weeks of vacation.
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: So you know, sort of think about wow, that's a lot of time, you know, maybe that's not for me.
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: So started thinking about you know how do I kind of circumnavigate that and get around it.
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: I had basically zero control over my time.
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: Right, it was way before COVID.
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: You know you're in the office every single day.
• 3:38
  Speaker 3: So, coworker ended up sending me a blog article by a guy by the name of Mr Money Mustache, and you may or may not have heard about him, but the blog article was basically about the math of early retirement and how much you need to save and invest to retire in your 30s or 40s or even your early 50s.
• 3:55
  Speaker 3: So you know, I immediately read that and was like firing on all cylinders.
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: I'm like I want to know everything there is to know about that.
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: Like that's my escape, hatch out of the cubicle, essentially.
• 4:06
  Speaker 3: So next thing I did was pop open a spreadsheet, ran some scenarios like hey, what if my wife and I, like you know, girlfriend at the time, what if we live on one income and save and invest, the other one, like how quickly can we be kind of done?
• 4:19
  Speaker 3: And you know, kind of ran home really excited to her and showed her like the graphs and stuff and she's like, hell, yeah, let's do it.
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: So you know that was the path we were on and you know our goal was like, okay, we're going to be financially independent, able to retire, you know, early 40s, mid 40s at the latest.
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: So we were on that path and you know I was progressing professionally and advancing my career and decided to go back to school for an MBA and through that whole process, as somebody who had never been exposed to finance and accounting and economics, things like that, it was super interesting to me.
• 4:55
  Speaker 3: I was like, okay, wow, this, you know, maybe I need to turn my career in this direction, something I'd enjoy more.
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: So that's exactly what I did Took a pivot from engineering to corporate finance and did that for about eight or 10 years.
• 5:07
  Speaker 3: Fast forward to middle of COVID, you know everybody had a lot of extra time to sit around and think we weren't commuting, we weren't sitting in offices, you know, kind of locked in our homes, and people are age you know I'm 38, people my age were dying Like you saw news stories about it and I was like, okay, wow, maybe I don't really want to grind it out for another seven to 10 years to early retirement.
• 5:31
  Speaker 3: Maybe I need to just like find something that's fulfilling now and will give me control over my time now.
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: So that's kind of where the idea started coming in.
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: And you know I started looking at all these other financial planners that were starting solo RIAs and I was like you know, I can probably do that.
• 5:49
  Speaker 3: And I'm super interested in it.
• 5:51
  Speaker 3: I know a lot about it.
• 5:51
  Speaker 3: I'd already started the CFA curriculum as part of professional development years ago, so that's what I decided to do is like I'm going to start my own firm.
• 6:00
  Speaker 3: It's going to be a solo practice and I'm going to finish out the CFA and then immediately register.
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: So that's what I did.
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: It was kind of the idea was hatched in the middle of COVID and every art.
• 6:11
  Speaker 3: Today, you know, I'm here and a half in and couldn't be happier.
• 6:14
  Speaker 3: I just I did double duty with my corporate job for about 15 months and just cut the cord back in July.
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: So yeah, it feels great.
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: No regrets, like the meme says.
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: But yeah super happy.
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: That's the short story.
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: I love it.
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: Well, that's a great.
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: I mean that's great, I mean that's what you want everyone to do is to find happiness in their work.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: But I mean, was there like a friend or a mentor or like, was there some like you know?
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: Was there someone else that you saw that might have had this lifestyle or this flexibility?
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: And you're like wow, you know what this is challenging, what I thought you know the nine to five is cracked up to be.
• 6:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, my biggest mentor at that time was Cody Garrett.
• 7:01
  Speaker 3: Make sure you guys know Cody.
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: And you know him and I had been bouncing around the fire groups for years.
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: I knew his name, I knew he'd become a financial planner.
• 7:09
  Speaker 3: So I just sent him a message and was like, hey, I want to learn more about honest financial planning and you know he was very generous with his time, walked me through financial plans, how he runs his business, you know the P&L, everything about it.
• 7:22
  Speaker 3: So I was like, okay, this is doable right.
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: Like you don't need to spend 50 or $100,000 on business expenses.
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: Like you can run a very lean practice, you know just kind of started conceptualizing it in my mind.
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: So Cody was a huge help on that.
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that is cool man.
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: Where did you so now that you're doing what you're doing, right Cause I know you love what you're doing now but back when you were in your previous career and you were looking into the fire stuff cause you see a lot of people doing that right it always kind of like begs the question for me, is it like, do you not enjoy what you're doing enough so you want to just like invest all the money that you can so that you can retire early, where now you find that there's a sense of like I actually love doing this and maybe I don't want to retire as earlier?
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: Is there still a party of you that has the fire movement in you, like what is?
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: How?
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: Has that kind of changed your view on things and your trajectory and your path now?
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a great question, you know.
• 8:19
  Speaker 3: I like to say that I used to think I wanted to retire in my early 40s, but it turns out I just wanted control over my time and fulfilling work and you know the financial planning provides both of those in my case.
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: So you know, I've really let the foot off the gas as far as that goes.
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: I mean, we're not saving and investing as nearly as much as we were, because I can see myself doing this until my 70s later right.
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: It's so enjoyable and it's cliche to say it, but it doesn't feel like work.
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, what a mindset shift though.
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: Really that's the complete like.
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: You just are like, yeah, I guess we could just throw 30 years on top of what I was planning on doing as far as retirement, because they actually like what I'm doing now, Like that's huge man.
• 9:01
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, it's a huge shift and, like you know, my wife and I, everything's about balance right, like living for today versus saving for tomorrow, and like we were very much on the saving for tomorrow because we just wanted to have that financial freedom.
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: But you know, at this point we're much more comfortable spending a lot of money on travel and experiences with our kids while they're young, because that's only a certain season of life.
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: So, yeah, it's really kind of tipped the mindset on its head in the last two or three years, so that's definitely a shift.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's gotta be interesting.
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: As a financial planner, right, and coming in from the fire perspective, right, Cause I think that when you look at it, you know a lot of people.
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: They'll boil it down to okay, well, do you hate your job, you know, and then is that worth living for?
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: But I mean, like from your experience though, I mean, what do you think is the main motivator for people who want to do fire?
• 9:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think there's a bit of, I would say a majority of people are probably like hey, I don't enjoy what I'm doing, so I'm just gonna get out as quickly as possible, like exactly what I got was right.
• 10:05
  Speaker 3: But I think there's genuinely a certain segment of the fire population that's like, hey, I don't really mind what I'm doing, or I might even enjoy what I'm doing, but I want that safety net of if I wake up one day and I decide like, okay, I wanna go volunteer, or I wanna go join the Peace Corps or whatever it is like.
• 10:21
  Speaker 3: I wanna have that flexibility to know that my bills are paid, whether I'm working or not.
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: So, I think there are a couple of different camps there, yeah no, I mean it's good though right, like everybody's entitled to what they wanna do and have their opinions and stuff, but I do find it fascinating and super cool that, like literally just finding a way to get your time back and find something that you're more passionate about completely changed the way that you saw the rest of your life, which is a beautiful thing, man.
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: I love that.
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: So now that you've started the firm, what has it been like from kind of the inception of the firm to, like you said, cutting the cord back in July?
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: What does that all of that kind of look like for you?
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's been a ride.
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: So started in April of 2022, I basically picked up four clients, four ongoing clients.
• 11:09
  Speaker 3: 2022, I did a bunch of one-time plans and there was a dry spell there, like probably August 2022 till February 23 this year.
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: There was a period of time where I didn't pick up any new clients and I was kind of like trying to figure out what is it right Like what is it the marketing?
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: Is it the sales?
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: What exactly is going on here?
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: So ended up actually making a pretty significant investment in a sales training course.
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: I'd never had sales training in my entire life, right, so I figured that I needed to improve that skillset and paid off big time.
• 11:43
  Speaker 3: Like I said, kind of started the year with four ongoing clients.
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: Right now I've got, including the wait list, it's 18.
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: So pretty tremendous growth this year.
• 11:55
  Speaker 3: I'm really happy with 2023, gonna kind of go into 2024 really strong.
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: But I deliberately structured this as a lifestyle practice.
• 12:04
  Speaker 3: I don't wanna be building some huge 100 client thing.
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: I don't wanna be hiring people, I don't wanna be dealing with all of that.
• 12:11
  Speaker 3: So it's really like kind of 30 to 40 clients is what my vision is for capacity and that'll provide us a very good lifestyle.
• 12:19
  Speaker 3: That'll allow us to save for the future, of course, but really kind of allow that flexibility with time, my wife and I are big on travel.
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: A family really loves that.
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: So if I can have a manageable level of clients and we can travel extensively in the summers, for example when my kids are out of school, that's really what we're looking for.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: lifestyle- that's yeah, no.
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: I mean I love your clarity behind the business and I mean Even other advisors that I have talked to.
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: They just love the name of your business, the seven Saturdays, financial and your outlook on everything.
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: But before we move on, I mean I have to ask like, what was it specifically in that sales coaching?
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: You know, because you know there's other advisors who they come in here as well and some you know they're very good marketers and then they lack on maybe the financial planning or the back end, right, and then there's some planners who absolutely knock it out of the park on the financial planning in the back end but they might be struggling or you know a cylinder isn't firing on the marketing and sales.
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: Like what were some of those?
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: Just like bullet points, if you will.
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: That you're like, wow, you know, just these two or three simple bullet points really help my business.
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a good question.
• 13:32
  Speaker 3: I would say the biggest things for me were Just having kind of a framework to guide the conversation, like, okay, this part of the conversation, my goal is this, and these are the types of things I want to say, these, this is how I want to say it, you know, rather than just kind of fumbling through without a script, so to say so there was that.
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: There was also just gaining confidence around it, like, okay, I have a system right.
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: Like, not only do I have a system, I'm confident in the system.
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: You know, I've practiced it.
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: I've practiced it with cohorts of other people.
• 14:01
  Speaker 3: It's it's kind of proven.
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: So Just learning, like the different aspects of that again, like, rather than just fumbling through the conversation, which is what I was doing Was was super helpful.
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: But yeah, practice Definitely takes practice.
• 14:15
  Speaker 3: It's like any other skill and I think just having a level of self-awareness, like you said, peter, you know some some folks are really strong on sales and marketing, but they're kind of lacking on the, on the technical stuff.
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: It's like just having that self-awareness of what am I good at, what do I need to bring up to speed, and then kind of focusing attention on on those things.
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah so yeah working Sorry, yeah, so like.
• 14:42
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I was just gonna say so networking with other advisors has been big for you.
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: And coming into the business with Cody Garrett, you know, since we met like at XYPN Last year in person, you know like how has that event kind of helped build your business, because I remember you saying we sat down like one of the last nights.
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: You're like this has maybe been one of the best investments, for my business is coming to XYPN.
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: Yeah, there was.
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: You know there were a lot of aspects of XYPN that I really enjoyed, like, obviously they have the seminars where you learn a lot of Stuff that you can take home and apply to your business.
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: But you know, the networking is just priceless learning people, meeting people that come from similar backgrounds like I met a guy who was an engineer turned financial advisor, so, like him and I were able to kind of nerd out on that and you know, even Meeting people from very different backgrounds that you know, hey, this person serves a particular client niche, but you know, I've gotten referrals from other advisors that know that I would potentially be a better fit for their prospects.
• 16:17
  Speaker 3: So you know, the networking was super invaluable.
• 16:19
  Speaker 3: And then, just like the motivation aspect of it, you know that that really put a fire in my belly.
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: I was six months into my firm when, when I went to XYPN live last year and it really like crystallized, like okay, this, this is what I'm doing, like this is, you know, the Japanese concept of icky guy.
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: Like a reason for being.
• 16:40
  Speaker 3: It was like okay.
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: This is a long.
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: I found it.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean there's also so in like the broker dealer world, or when you're a part of a big financial company or something like that, right there's.
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: There is like a sense of camaraderie Albeit, maybe you're selling something you shouldn't or you know, forcing whole life on people, whatever.
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: But I feel like.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, details.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: But in the in the world of like the fee only culture man, it can get lonely right, because a lot of people are solo producers, are kind of doing what you're doing.
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: You're like, how the hell do I spend my time today?
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: I quite all I need to be doing and it's nice to have a community and in the Facebook group, and then also that gathering of people to say, oh man, I've been thinking about this a lot lately, like this is something I'm struggling with.
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: Oh wait, there's literally a thousand other people that are struggling with the same thing or trying to figure it out.
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: But I want to go back to the sales thing for a second, because Peter and I we do that at least once in episode where we're both Trying to talk at the same time.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: So what was there something about like that you were realizing about your sales process as well?
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: That was like you have to ask the hard question Like is there anything that would keep you from working with me or are you open to working with me?
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: Like a lot of times, people will get things out on the table.
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: You're like talking it to death.
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: Like does this make sense?
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, do you?
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: You, you understand everything I'm saying here and you're kind of waiting for them to be like okay.
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: So, like, how do I work with you?
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: Like, was there any of that getting over that hump of like actually asking people if they'd be willing to work with you or, you know, was, was that a thing for you as well?
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that was part of it, for sure.
• 18:21
  Speaker 3: I mean I wasn't making the ask at the end, which is like, yeah, any sales training you ever go through is gonna be like you have to ask, right, you have to ask, yeah, but you know, having not gone through any of that, it was like it just felt weird and uncomfortable to ask and pushy almost.
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: But yeah, I mean just learning kind of the psychology behind the sales process and understanding that you know your competition is not other advisors, like your competition is the person that you're speaking to, like going off and not doing anything, and then you know they go drift off for five or ten years and make bad financial decisions.
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: So it's like helping facilitate the process to where they can Make an informed decision, moving forward.
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: Like part of that is is making the ask and like, hey, how does all everything we talked about sound right?
• 19:03
  Speaker 3: like just getting that feedback and then you can address.
• 19:05
  Speaker 3: You can address any Concerns or objections truthfully.
• 19:09
  Speaker 3: Before you know they make assumptions and just kind of go off in their own little world and Make judgments about it.
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: So yeah, that's been a huge piece of it as well.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, definitely, and sometimes the biggest competition is that voice in your brain that's trying to tell you that you can't do it right, or you shouldn't ask, or it's going to be uncomfortable.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: It's like, no, what's uncomfortable is they're waiting for you to ask them if they'll work with you and you're not doing it.
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: So I love that man and congratulations on the growth.
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: I mean to have four clients in 2022 and then, including the waiting list, beat 18 this year.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: It shows that it seriously had an impact.
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: But what are you trying to focus on right now in the practice?
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: Like you figured out some of the sales stuff, what's the next step?
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: To make seven Saturdays, you know, get to the next level.
• 19:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so it's really just scaling, like getting more efficient with my processes.
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: I do spring and fall surge meetings for ongoing clients, so I've got a fall surge and then it's the biggest one I've ever done.
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: Right, it's going to be continuing to get bigger and bigger as I onboard more clients, but as well as onboarding that weightless of clients in October and November.
• 20:16
  Speaker 3: That's just going to be a challenge from a time management perspective.
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: So really need to figure out how to squeeze out those efficiencies.
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: And then a constant challenge for me this year has been pulling back on the detail, like I'm an engineer, right.
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: So getting down to the nth degree and a lot of that's way over clients' heads and they don't care about it.
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: So kind of having that self-awareness again is okay.
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: Maybe I don't need to show it to that level.
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: I can pull it back.
• 20:45
  Speaker 3: We can talk about a high level and I have the detail if they want to really dig into it.
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: They rarely do.
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: Maybe they get a client who's also an engineer or an attorney or something like that.
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: But that's been a challenge for me and just something to work on as well.
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's awesome.
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: Let's talk a little bit about processes.
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: I mean, you have 18 people on the waitlist.
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: Some people here might think you're crazy and they're like why aren't you setting all 18 people to meet next week?
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: How do you spend your time and what are some of your processes as far as onboarding clients?
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: So you make sure you're not just rinse and repeat and you make sure everyone gets the true 7 Saturdays experience.
• 21:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a balance of strike and just for clarity, I think I've got like 12, 13 clients that are kind of ongoing and then the waitlist is roughly six or so.
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: So obviously a lot of stuff to keep straight, keep organized.
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: But again, it's a balancing act between you don't want to give cookie cutter solutions, you don't want to put everybody through a factory, but you want it to be efficient and you want to give personalized advice.
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: Right, like some people who are entering retirement have very different needs than somebody who's 35 years old and still saving for retirement.
• 22:01
  Speaker 3: So that's one thing I like about having a target client base.
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: That's like a client capacity.
• 22:09
  Speaker 3: That's manageable is I can continue to provide that personalized guides and I don't have to make it a factory.
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: Right, it doesn't have to be the world's most efficient thing, it just has to be efficient enough.
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, have you set kind of guidelines and boundaries of how quickly you'll let people come on or how many people you're willing to onboard per month, or like hard boundaries?
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: What does that look like for you and how are you kind of managing that the flow of people coming in?
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah, good question.
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: I've got basically a rule of two onboarding per month, so the onboarding process doesn't take a month.
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: But I'll start basically two new people every single month and then theoretically two people roll off the onboarding process and be put in the normal client service calendar.
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: So that keeps it manageable for me from a client perspective.
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: Obviously I'm onboarding clients and I'm also servicing existing clients, so that's really the target that I set for myself, and it seems to be working pretty well.
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, there you go, finding your niche.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: I'm over here reading your LinkedIn right now.
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: I know your fee only, so we have to talk about fees a little bit.
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: But virtual, independent flat fee, no commissions, no BS.
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: I love it.
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: So let's talk about flat fees Like what are your thoughts in general?
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: Why are you so passionate about it and how does it fit it the client that you're working with and the planning and the service that you're providing?
• 23:37
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 23:37
  Speaker 3: So a lot of people like to hammer the flat fee thing a little bit more than I do, but for me flat fees just made the most sense.
• 23:46
  Speaker 3: I think portfolio size like charging based on the size of portfolio is kind of a poor proxy for complexity and how much time and effort it's going to take on the advisor side.
• 23:58
  Speaker 3: So I just wanted something that made a little bit more sense that the price is based on the service provided, not what you have in assets.
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: So logically it made sense to me, just economically, for a lot of my clients somebody with $1 million, $2 million net worth, right, like they could be paying $10,000 or $20,000 a year at a traditional advisor, whereas you know if they come to a flat fee advisor they're probably gonna be paying five to 10, right, and that cost is not gonna be going up eight to 10%, along with the size of their portfolio, right?
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: So I feel like a lot of people don't really have an understanding of what they're paying in fees.
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: But flat fee really just lays it out transparently.
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah, somebody like what are you paying in fees?
• 24:39
  Speaker 3: Oh, I'm only paying 1%.
• 24:40
  Speaker 3: It's like, okay, but how much is that 1% in dollars, right?
• 24:43
  Speaker 3: Is that $30,000?
• 24:44
  Speaker 3: , is that $40,000?
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: And most people have no idea.
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: They haven't actually sat down and done math on it.
• 24:50
  Speaker 3: So just made the most sense for me.
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: And then, as well, as kind of reducing conflicts of interest, right, if you're paid based on the size of the portfolio, you've got an incentive to increase the amount of assets that are in the portfolio, which you know hey should I pay off my house?
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: Should I buy an annuity?
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: Should I gift to my children or charity right Like?
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: All those things will reduce the size of the managed portfolio, reduce the advisors paycheck.
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: So I just wanted to kind of eliminate all that and go with the flat fee.
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, now that makes complete sense.
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: And honestly, man, when it clicked with me about why a flat fee could make a lot of sense, it was when we had Andy Panko on the show on the podcast and he said look, the goal is not to serve everybody for the same fee, right, like I understand you could say well, how are you gonna say this person would work $10 million or $20 million with all this estate planning and this person with $500,000 should pay the same fee?
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: It's like the goal is not to work with both of those crews, it's to find the people that you work with, whose situations and complexities you can really serve to the best of your ability.
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: That will justify and make sense for the fee.
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: And when he said that, it was like a light bulb went off in my head.
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: I'm like that's where flat fee makes a lot of sense and where it can really be, I think, in a lot of ways, one of the best ways to charge for sure.
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and a lot of people love to glamorize I mean you see it even in people's LinkedIn headers Ultra high net worth.
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: Like I feel like there's more ultra high net worth advisors than there are individuals, you know, like there's only it's such a small population of people and so many advisors wanna act like their fingers are in it and it's just not true.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: I mean, the flat fee just makes a lot of sense for certain demographics, so let's talk a little bit about, like, what else has been working with you as far as marketing, you know.
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: I mean, I see you on Twitter, I see you on LinkedIn.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: Are you still active in these fire groups?
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: Like, where are you finding all these clients coming from if they're not in your niche too?
• 27:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a good question.
• 27:01
  Speaker 3: So it's been kind of a shotgun approach.
• 27:04
  Speaker 3: You know, I don't have one thing that's like a silver bullet, but yeah, basically like writing content on LinkedIn and Twitter I started that a little bit over a year ago, and that's been an interesting journey.
• 27:16
  Speaker 3: Looking back on my earlier posts and be like hey that one really sucked.
• 27:20
  Speaker 3: So you can definitely see like writing is also a skill that can be improved over time.
• 27:25
  Speaker 3: I've actually enjoyed it quite a bit, so I think a lot of people resonate with my content and get a lot of traction there.
• 27:33
  Speaker 3: Also being listed on directories like the only network and Wealth Tender.
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: I've gotten several prospects and clients from those sources.
• 27:40
  Speaker 3: Plus those help like your SEO a lot.
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: Just having those sources linked to your website just gives you a lot of credibility Google searches and things like that.
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: I've already mentioned the referrals from other advisors.
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: You know if somebody's not a great fit for another advisor, that's what's great about this community is there's like no scarcity mindset.
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: Right, like everybody's like hey there's plenty of clients Like there's more than enough clients out there Like here, I would refer you to this person because they're a better fit for your situation.
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: So that's been awesome.
• 28:09
  Speaker 3: And then I would say the fourth one would be just being like, present and helpful on Facebook groups.
• 28:15
  Speaker 3: Like you know, I'm in the ChooseFI group I'm on.
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: Andy Panko's taxes and retirement group.
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: You know just being a helpful individual and like not selling yourself, but you know, if you give thoughtful and helpful responses to people, there's a certain number of people on that website that are gonna say, okay, who is this guy?
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: Click on the profile oh, he's an advisor.
• 28:35
  Speaker 3: Like I'm looking for an advisor, my friend's looking for an advisor, so it's kind of naturally can get you business that way yeah.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, that makes sense.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: The shotgun approach, man, is what it's all about, the beginning especially, I'd say.
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: I mean I remember, you know, I was cold calling advisors when I was trying to meet them.
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: I was posting on LinkedIn.
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: I started to Twitter maybe later than I should have, but started that and all of it's kind of culminated into, you know, working longterm.
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: But the beginning it's just like by all means necessary and doing what you gotta do.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: But I think that one thing to be really useful is if you could tell us what you would say to yourself.
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: If you're talking to yourself a year ago, right With those four clients, knowing that you're going to be in the position that you're in today, what would you have said to yourself back then?
• 29:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a good question.
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: First thing I'd say is probably like don't panic, like it's a slow grind, but you know business will come, so first of all don't freak out about it.
• 29:38
  Speaker 3: The other thing I would give myself advice on is like don't worry about getting everything 100% perfect with your onboarding workflow and your planning process, and you know your technology, automations and linking everything together and you know it's all going to change a dozen times anyway.
• 29:55
  Speaker 3: So spending all these mental cycles, getting it perfect right out front is just kind of a waste of time, like get a minimum viable product, get something that works good enough and then focus your efforts on business development, whatever that looks like for you.
• 30:08
  Speaker 3: So you know, I probably would have gone out and got the sales training earlier, I would have focused a lot more on marketing and business development, and you know even started reaching out cold calling.
• 30:19
  Speaker 3: You know if it got to that point, but yeah, really just don't try to get everything perfect up front.
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: Great points.
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: Workflows don't matter if no one's going through the workflow.
• 30:30
  Speaker 3: Right, you need people to test it.
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: Yes, you need some giddy pigs.
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: So awesome, man.
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: Well, was there anything you wanted to say on here before we let you go, man?
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: Word of wisdom, courage.
• 30:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I would just say you know what I've learned over the last year and a half, especially with working with clients.
• 30:55
  Speaker 3: Right, you learn so much working with clients and just that experience.
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: I would say that one of the things that I try to keep in mind that there's very few decisions that boil down to like a black and white right or wrong answer, like you should always do this or you should never do that, and it'll vary based on clients.
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: But you know, ultimately it's all about managing tradeoffs.
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: Right, every decision has a tradeoff Option A versus option B.
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: So just trying to keep things in perspective from that view and just want to thank you guys for everything you do from an educational and collaborative approach, really really like the way you guys do business and I think you're definitely doing it right.
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: Thanks, man.
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: Thank you, man.
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: That's a great point, and I mean truly.
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: The answer is it depends Always.
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, depending on whether or not people want to follow you, how can people see your content and join along on the ride?
• 31:50
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm most active on LinkedIn, so just search for me, alan Mueller.
• 31:55
  Speaker 3: Twitter is a good one too.
• 31:57
  Speaker 3: My handle on Twitter is number seven Saturdays a week, and then, of course, my website for my business is number sevensaturdaysfinancialcom.
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: You'll find it there.
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: Love it, man.
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: Well, thank you so much for coming on, and we're going to see you next week, hopefully at XYPN.
• 32:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, looking forward to it.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: Awesome.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: Thanks, alan, all right.
• 32:22
  Speaker 3: What do you think?